Two weeks after the fall of the Syrian regime, new details emerge on the events that in recent months have prepared the events, up to the escape of Bashar al Assad and his family to Russia. The Pentagon admitted that US troops deployed in Syria had been increased from around 900 troops to more than 2,000 to counter ISIS even before the fall of the national government. This was said by the spokesperson of the Unified Central Command (Centcom), Major General Pat Ryder, who yesterday, Thursday 19 December, declared: “I learned today that, in fact, there are still around two thousand US soldiers in Syria.” That he didn’t know it is hardly credible, but Ryder himself had previously told journalists that there were 900 units in the country as part of the US’s decade-long fight against the armed groups of the Islamic State, with rotations of nine or twelve months at a time, while it appears that the 1,100 additional forces would have been sent at the end of October for an expected period of between 30 and 90 days. Then there is the question of self-protection: since Israel’s war in Gaza began, American troops in the Middle East, including Syria, have suffered more and more attacks: since October 17, 2023, at least 181 events have occurred across the region . The Marine officer GRD (full name not revealed), in contact with the writer, says that operations in Syria are such as to require considerable logistical support and continuous transport of units to US bases outside the territories.
But without that presence, that is, of pilots and technicians with attack helicopters, communications workers, healthcare workers and intelligence analysts, it would be impossible to complete the mission of minimizing the availability of armaments in the hands of ISIS. The front, however, is still hot and for this reason General Ryder was unable to divulge which departments the troops came from, which units were involved or even what their specific mission was, apart from the fact that most of the troops come from army. The journalists present at the press conference did not like this mystery and when asked how it was possible that so many forces are in Syria without their knowledge, the answer was this: “I am sure that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is monitoring US forces deployed around the world,” Ryder said, “often there will be diplomatic or operational security considerations in relation to the deployment of forces, and whether they will be made public in the future.”
Part of the job was undoubtedly making contact with the rebels to have Americans released from Syrian prisons turned over to take them to Jordan and repatriate them from there, but Ryder said that Defense Secretary Austin never requested that the number of deployed soldiers be kept confidential nor did he directly respond to a question about fact that part of the Department of Defense attempted to hide the information, instead publicly declaring that the number of troops in Syrian territory was 900 units. Since the fall of Damascus, the United States and Israel have bombed the country with hundreds of sorties conducted through air strikes, hitting targets that were once off-limits due to the regime or Russian forces operating in the area, also increasing law enforcement operations of ISIS in Iraq in order to prevent the flow of supplies to Syria. For this reason, Ryder confirmed, “The extra forces were inside Syria before the fall of the regime.” And I have no interest in directly eliminating Assad, it is clear that the president’s escape was followed by the US without interfering with the Russian operations that allowed him to reach the Latakia base, from where he would then leave on a military flight to Moscow . Meanwhile, President-elect Donald Trump has publicly asked the outgoing administration not to further involve the United States in military operations in the country, recalling that during his first presidency he tried to withdraw the military from Syria, and that for this reason his first Secretary of Defense was forced to resign.
Now the question becomes administrative: the House of Representatives rejected a bill supported by Trump himself but without the vote of many Republicans, leaving the USA exposed to the risk of shutdown (closure of government activities) before Christmas. Tycoon did not have the support of some members of the Republican right who refused to support a package that would increase spending and further increase the federal debt. Government funding expires today at midnight Washington time (6am tomorrow in Italy), and if congresspeople fail to extend the deadline, the US government will begin a partial shutdown that will also cut off funding to public workers like military. “Congress must eliminate or extend the ridiculous debt ceiling to 2029,” Trump said in a post on his Truth social media platform a few hours after the bill’s failure. However, Ryder reassured: “In the event of a funding interruption and government shutdown starting December 21, the Department of Defense will continue to carry out the mission of defending our nation and the American people; military personnel would continue to report for duty and perform assigned missions around the world to protect national security.” We’ll see how it ends tonight.
